Kingdom of Monsters - Empire of Sand Series

Chapter 5.2

At first, only her breath sounded, harsh in her throat. She heard the rustle of old stalks from where she had tied the worthless thistle to her pack. Ahead, the corner, there, the next clearing—they might see her—into woods again. Her legs jellied. Her belly melted like wet, sticky pitch. Thanks to her father's kannen-a, she flew.

Forest crashed behind her.

Ah, the soldiers—

No. Trees slapped each other as they fell before and behind her, crushed under pounding claws. The chicken stretched its furred neck. One beady eye tilted on her. Its tongue jogged and twisted, a pink thing.

She angled off the trail, into scrub.

Arrows whistled past.

The beast growled, a deep un-chicken-like sound in its belly, and whirled to face its attackers.

She kept running. Running, burning, and shaking, until her body dripped moisture like a limp rag and her legs twisted inward, and still she ran, finally breaking onto the road again, the distant thrashing sounds not as distant as she would like.

There, the turn!

Down the first switchback, and the second. There, she had met the group of soldiers. Her breath tied knots in her ears and ached. The river roared. Loud. Louder. The slope roughened. Pebbles clattered down the cliffs and disappeared. The river rushed below, loud as the beast's bugle, and angry. Not the serene depths of her memory. No, this river smashed rock and ripped trees out by their roots.

She craned around the corner for the Stone Bridge. Built when Sylla-Alla scooped up two boulders of the mountain and pressed them together, the two banks would remain united as long as they maintained their friendship. She would beg refuge from the Blue Fin tribe.

Oh, where was the bridge?

A man landed in her path.

She slammed into his chest. Demian! She went limp, gasping through her ragged throat and ragged heartbeat.

And then she struggled past him.

He caught her. "Stop."

"Please," she gasped. "The bridge—"

"Is destroyed."

"But the village—"

"Is abandoned."

She shook her head. Twilight spirits garbled his words, braving full midday.

"An advance guard swept it clear while we spoke." Demian pushed her back on her feet, though her legs refused to hold her. "The bridge fell this morning."

She shook her head again, breath returning with reluctant comprehension. "That bridge was guarded by a god."

"And yet it broke into pieces."

Rocks clattered and plopped into the river, unsettled. The cliffs had trembled all the way back to the previous night's army camp; now, giving weight to her words, the ground beneath her feet shifted and her belly dropped. The world itself might collapse with the god's anger.

She eased back on her heels. "Your army tampers with evil magic."

"It is not my army," its general said. "And you cannot escape this direction."

She tried to pull free of his grasp. "Very well, let me go then."

"You'll be recaptured or killed. Do you think we are the only army to ride this road?"

"I'll go forward, along these cliffs, until I reach another crossing. Until I reach the headland if I have to."

"The headland of this river lies in the Frost."

"Better Frost than blades of shale."

"Frost is suicide, do you understand? You may as well follow our blackened trails and make your own way into the bloody Serengai. At least their beasts don't wear the faces of men. Yet."

She shoved him, the power of her frustration giving her weight enough to force him back one step. "Let me go."

"Don't be so eager to die. Don't you have a person that you must live for?"

"So, please—"

He swung her behind him. An arrow flashed. Its feather scraped her nose and holed his vest.

"Your army mistakes you for the monster," she told his taut shoulder, unsettled.

"It mistakes me for nothing." His teeth gritted. "Arctavian finally acts on his treachery."

"But you're the General!"

"Not popularly."

Faces appeared at the top of the ridge. The soldiers who had been pacing her had secretly been waiting for him to appear. Now, separated from his loyal men, isolated, they sprang their trap.

He bent low, arms out to embrace their rain of death. "Draw their aim."

Arrows whistled past her ear. "What?"

He dodged and plucked two from the air before her face. "Run!"

She turned and stumbled down the remnants of the trail. A boulder crashed behind her, and someone roared with rage. Below, the road of her memory crumbled into the engorged river. She slipped on the moss and skidded to the edge. Her pack pushed her from behind. Her toes scrabbled in the damp moss.

Demian grabbed her arm.

Solid rock shifted.

The moss dropped away beneath her feet.

She screamed.

Demian arrested her fall.

Her scream ghosted away like the mist creatures of the waterfall.

He yanked her up to his level, over-stretching her arm with a painful snap.

The cliffside shifted again. She fell, and he fell too. As they fell, he leapt for the ridge above them and got hold of rock. With his last strength, he tried to throw her onto the ledge.

The entire cliffside fell away.

They both tumbled toward the river. His body cratered first. The cliff fell on top of him, boulders smashing against river rocks and exploding next to his head.

Fist-sized chunks whistled past her ear and shrapnel pummeled her.

Demian grunted and disappeared beneath the surface. She splashed into his sloped wake.

Cold sucked her under, hushed and dull. Her arms wrenched backward, weighted by her sinking pack. She struggled free and thrashed for the surface. Gasping air, she fell again as water spirits yanked her legs into Sylla-Alla's watery bed.

Lunsa twisted from their embrace. Her lungs sucked against themselves. She stroked furiously for the light. Her mouth broke the surface, and she gasped again.

Air!